Cross-posted from the April Edition of the Citizen Reader.
Every year, as part of the Council’s oversight responsibilities, the various committees send out a list of questions to each of the agencies within their purview. The questions and agencies’ responses are then posted on the Council’s Home Page under Agency Responses providing the public with a wealth of information rarely seen elsewhere.
Because of Mayor Bowser’s changes in the office of the Deputy Mayor for Education (DME) when she took office last year, such as moving the DCPS chancellor and the Department of Parks and Recreation into the DME’s responsibilities, and because of the DME’s description of its mission, which says in part, “…responsibility for developing and implementing the Mayor’s vision for academic excellence and creating a high quality education…”, and because, though she has made numerous announcements of particular initiatives, the Mayor has not yet presented her own vision or over-all plan for education in DC to the public, it seems worthwhile to the Citizen Reader to give some attention to a few of the Committee on Education’s oversight questions of the DME’s office.
The Committee asked 49 questions which, together with the responses, take up 44 pages not including the many appendixes. Below are some of the questions in their original words in bold italics. The responses are summarized in regular type.
Q1. Discuss each of the programmatic and policy initiatives the DME has worked on in FY15 and FY16 to date. Please include details about a long-term strategic plan if there is one being developed.
The response lists and describes in detail the following: My School DC, (Supply, Demand, Need data), LEA Payment initiative, Equity Reports, since 2013, Truancy Task Force, Request for Offer (RFO), Transportation Working Group (TWG), Cross Sector Task Force, and ReEngagement Center evaluation.
The response does not mention a long-term strategic plan, but the details offered on the LEA Payment initiative say that the way that money is allocated to DCPS and the Charter Schools will change so that, beginning in SY16-17, both receive funds based on their audited enrollment rather than the Charters by audited and DCPS by projected enrollment.
Q4. In June, the National Academy of Sciences released it five-year evaluation of public education in the District of Columbia under mayoral control. Discuss and provide plans for how the DME intends to address each of the following three recommendations from the study:
– Recommendation 1: The District of Columbia should have a comprehensive data warehouse that makes basic information about the school system available in one place that is readily accessible online to parents, the community, and researchers.
The response mentions the Office of State Superintendent’s LearnDC website that provides “school level information on the metrics of federal accountability measures including assessments (report card tab), student enrollment, college-readiness, and growth in student achievement (profile tab), and how well schools equitably serve students including suspensions and expulsions and enrollment mobility and detailed subgroup presentation (equity reports tab).”
It also says that OSSE has requested $15 million for a 5-year capital investment, beginning in FY2017, and that OSSE’s staff and developers are meeting weekly to identify all the authoritative data that will be housed in the new data warehouse.
– Recommendation 2: The District of Columbia should establish institutional arrangements that will support ongoing independent evaluation of its public education system.
The response says the DME has met with various entities to discuss the best way to support ongoing evaluation including with the DC auditor and that the DME is also exploring best practice models from other jurisdictions.
– Recommendation 3: The District of Columbia’s primary objective for its public schools should be to address the serious and persistent disparities in learning opportunities and academic progress that are evident across student groups and neighborhoods, with equal attention to DCPS and public charter schools. To that end, the NRC Committee recommends that the city attend to:
Please note: Due to lack of space the five parts of this recommendation and their responses are not provided here.
Q 25. Provide an update on the 5-year Master Facilities Plan and what steps are being taken to follow the plan and how that aligns with capital improvement funding in the FY16 and FY17 budget.
The exact words of the response: “The DME has begun the process of designing the 2018 Master Facility Plan. DME is working closely with the Office of Planning, DCPS, DGS and the Public Charter School Board to outline the scope for the MFP that will be timely, relevant, accurate and forward looking. The 2018 MFP will seek to create a vision for District facility planning. It will be comprehensive including relevant data points from OP and PCSB. It will also provide the framework for school modernizations in the District; by including the latest EdSpec and a rationale for the CIP queuing order. But the MFP will not simply be a construction document. The MFP will set policy for DC facility planning by examining growth, capacity and for the need across sectors. DCPS and DGS have decided to retain the current queuing order through the FY’15-FY’20 CIP. After the MFP is updated in 2018, there will be an opportunity to revisit the CIP.”
Q 26. Do you anticipate any changes or revisions to the DCPS school boundary plan and if so what are those changes? In your response, please also provide an update and a timeline on how DME is working with DCPS, PCS and DGS to implement changes LEAs may need to their facilities.
Response: DCPS is responsible for implementing the boundary changes and there is now a new approach to modernizations where DCPS is in the “driver’s seat” while DGS is the implementing agency, a change that aims to better coordinate the facilities work with DCPS’s overall plan and vision. No major facilities changes are needed to implement the boundary plan at this time. A summary of changes to the boundary plan since 2014 is given. Most are delayed starting dates. Recommendation 19 has been changed from the plan to reopen Ron Browne MS as a specialized/selective MS to a plan to open an Empowering Males of Color HS in SY16-17.
As noted at the beginning of this section, all the performance oversight questions and their responses can be read at www.dccouncil.us under Agency Responses.
A parent’s response to Question 15
Q15. Provide an update on the environmental and safety audits conducted in schools for FY15 and to date in FY16.
The response talks about levels of lead in the water in DC schools and both the question and the DME’s response are fully discussed in a very informative and insightful post on the blog educationdc.net on April 4, “Putting the “Lead” in DC Education Leaders,” by Valerie Jablow. This post was called a “great read” in the comments section of the DistrictMeasured.com blog.
This article was taken from the April Edition of the Citizen Reader which is a project of Livingview Communications—a citizens’ information service. Sarah Livingston, publisher & editor. Contact ess.livingston@gmail.com with corrections, letters to the editor, for previous issues or for an email subscription. Thanks!
